Last week chosen term f
or IATE was “binge drinking”, check it out if you still haven’t. We thought anyway it was a relevant social issue and decided to dedicate another post to the topic, perhaps in a more of a socialogical perspective. We finished last post with some historical reference, one of which was the song from Carmina Burana “In taberna quando sumus”. As said, the scenes described in the song involve what we today would call binge drinking.
Binge drinking has become a buzzword that seems to generate a lot of anxiety these days. As quickly explained before, the main aim of binge drinking is to become intoxicated by drinking a lot of alcohol in a short time. According to Merriam-Webster a “binge” is “a bout of prolonged or excessive drinking f.e. weekend binges are a serious problem at many colleges and universities. Synonyms are bender, bust, carousal, drunk, jamboree, spree, toot, wassail”. This is not the same as alcoholism, a term that according to psychiatrists includes a huge variety of pathological behaviours under the same definition, but it is popularly used to indicate compulsive drinking. Binge drinking is something different and according to some recent studies just as dangerous as regular alcoholism.
A recent study published by the Lancet on the most dangerous and expensive drugs (based on the money spent by governments in healtcare, assistance and prevention) called alcohol the most problematic of them all. Whereas the effects of standard alcoholism are clear, alcoholics don’t need to reach a pitch. Rather, they need to maintain or increase a level of intoxication over a long term. Also, they seem not to associate quite often and so easily the abuse of alcohol with other substances. On the other hand, people who expose themselves to binge drinking usually concentrate this behaviour in certain period of the week or the life, like weekend-drinkers or universities “freshmen”. Binge drinking is more associated with social occasions. The purpose being to basically “get high” in the fastest, and most stupid, way possible.
Although people tend to be aware of the dangers of regular alcoholism, they tend to underestimate the harm of binge drinking. Liver damages, psychological effects, and even serious social issues like vandalism or other anti-social behaviour. Around this time of the year you’ll easily find example in the news of freshmen across Europe’s universities facing hard physical consequences after initiations that included binge drinking. In one case, the trial didn’t even include alcohol, but simple water, and it resulted in a three day coma for a girl.
History does repeat itself. Words and terms can sometimes show us how much it does.
by Brecht Savelkoul
CommunicationsTrainee at TermCoord
and
Matteo Poles
Social Media Specialist
Communication Trainee at TermCoord